Ronald W. Erdrich/Reporter-News
Winning pecans are on display during the Eastland County Pecan Show on Wednesday at the Eastland County Courthouse in Eastland. While this year's pecan harvest was large, judge Bob Whitney said the quality was poorer statewide.

Abilene Reporter-News

EASTLAND — Call it nuts, but in a pecan show, taste ain't worth spit.

"Taste becomes immaterial," said judge Bob Whitney. He called the differences between pecan flavors too subtle to notice. "People will disagree with me, but if I do a blind taste test with them using different varieties of pecans, they can't tell me which one they ate. They won't know."

The Eastland County Pecan Show was Wednesday in the Eastland County Courthouse lobby. Entries sat on tables around a Christmas tree, beyond a vacant, green leather chair that sported on its back a large paper sign declaring in block letters, "Keeper of the Nuts."

But Whitney, a former Comanche County Extension Agent, resisted any temptation to crack wise about pecans or pecan judging.

"I'm looking at a variety for its normal characteristics," he said and gestured to a table of Burkett pecans. "So the first thing I do is go through and ask, 'Is this a typical Burkett? Am I happy with it?'"

Pecans are judged on appearance but also on size, specifically amount per pound and percentage of kernel meat. Just because a pecan nut appears large, that doesn't mean what's inside will appear the same.

Growers across the state saw that for themselves this season.

"Part of the problem this year was we got some rains early and the pecans got big, because that happens in the first part of the summer," he said. "But in the second half it fills and unfortunately, that's when it got hot and dry."

The lack of water meant kernels turned out smaller.

"We ended up with poor quality this year with a lot of pecans simply because we couldn't fill that nut," Whitney said.

He called it an unusually large crop. But that doesn't translate into bumper crop when you're talking pecans.

"Old-time growers will tell you, 'Don't ever wish for a really good crop,'" he said. "Because when that happens, the trees load up and they just can't handle all those nuts, they can't fill them."

It's kind of like nature left the trees holding the bag. They received good rain at the start of the season but got zero when it came time to finish, which is when it mattered most.

"We expect a lot of the tree tops will die back this next year because the tree ran out of energy," Whitney said.

Commercial pecan growers will be working in the spring with fertilizers and crews to minimize any effect this might have on their orchards. Whitney said homeowners with one or more trees on their property can do the same.

Most people have heard that pecan trees alternate the years in which they produce nuts. Whitney said it has to do with the tree expending so much effort to bring forth its harvest that it simply takes a break the following season, allowing the nutrients to build up back in the soil and in the tree itself.

But that doesn't mean it has to be that way. If you want pecans each year from your tree, Whitney said you just have to treat it right.

"People that take really good care of their yards, they see a pecan crop. It may be light one year and heavy the next, but they'll see it," he said.

Whitney advised avoiding weed and feed fertilizers because they are hard on pecan roots.

"But other than that, lawn fertilizers work great on pecans," he said. "You could call them pecan fertilizers because it does the same thing."

Right now, however, the clock is ticking now that the shucks covering the pecan nuts have opened.

"The pecan begins to dry down as it's exposed to the elements," Whitney said. "That nut in the tree or on the ground — on the ground is worse — begins to get darker."

The oil in the pecan begins to age and eventually becomes rancid.

"It won't make you sick," he said. "Assuming it doesn't have any holes or cracks in the shell, it won't have any bacteria growing in it."

Instead, the meat will take on a bitter taste and at that point won't be good for much more than feeding squirrels.

"So what we tell people is that as quick as you can get them harvested, get them either into a refrigerator if you're going to use them fairly quickly, or put them into cold storage," he said.

The window for that is two or three months, but it doesn't hurt to get it done as soon as you can. Grabbing and sticking them on a shelf or in a closet won't work, either. You've simply moved them to spoil in a new location.

Commercial growers use machines to shake their trees to get all the nuts at once. Everyone else either relies on the wind or some brave soul willing to relive their childhood among the higher limbs.

"I have seen men over 60 years old in the tops of pecan trees shaking those trees," Whitney said with a chuckle.